Admiral Togo
Page 22
Tragedy marred Tōgō’s triumphal return. Back in Sasebo, he received an Imperial Order to bring his ships north for a more photogenic ‘homecoming’ closer to the capital. In order to file a report swiftly, Tōgō left the Mikasa at Sasebo and headed north by train – a journey that may have saved his life. On the night of 11/12 September, an ammunition explosion ripped through the Mikasa, sinking her in six fathoms of water with the loss of 590 men. The ship had survived the entire Russo-Japanese war, only to sink at the dockside with a loss of life exceeding that of the actual Battle of Tsushima. Even the Russians thought it was a cruel twist of fate – from captivity, Rozhestvensky sent Tōgō a telegram of condolence.1
Consequently, it was the Shikishima that played the role of Tōgō’s flagship at the celebrations. Tōgō’s homeward journey largely proceeded by land, as he was called upon to give thanks at the Ise Shrine and then to ride by train from Yokohama to Tokyo. Flag-waving crowds flanked the streets as Tōgō rode silently in a richly garlanded carriage pulled by two white horses. All were familiar with the official portrait of the famous Admiral, and jockeyed for position to see him. When Tōgō climbed down from his carriage and took off his hat, a gasp rippled through the crowd. The Russo-Japanese war had turned his hair white. For Tōgō, who wore his hair cropped close to his skull and whose jet-black beard had been starkly apparent in his much-duplicated official portrait, the transformation appeared all the more sudden. In fact, as Seppings Wright had observed, the Admiral’s hair was already streaked with flecks of grey in 1904, but the Japanese public had memorised his image from an old picture, and soon parleyed his rapid ageing into another folktale about his great loyalty to the Emperor.
Tōgō was mobbed as a conquering hero, much to his embarrassment – his sole expense amid the celebrations was a small outlay for the photographic negative of a picture of himself, taken by the court photographer. Even this was not vanity, but a concerted effort to stop the unscrupulous cameraman selling commemorative portraits. The British residents in Kobe were keen to claim him as one of their own, and entertained him at a banquet where he was honoured as an old cadet of the Worcester training college.2
Tōgō, however, remained quiet until the ceremony for the dead at Aoyama Cemetery, where he read an uncharacteristically lengthy speech. True to form, he saved his great moment and finest words for the heroic dead, whom he addressed directly:
The war clouds have vanished from land and sea and the whole city now lives in peace. Such was the condition on the day when the officers and men who risked their lives together with you returned in triumph to the Imperial Headquarters. When, regardless of both heat and cold, you gallantly fought with the enemy, we were not yet in a position to know how the war would end; and whenever any of you passed away, we envied you the honour you won by your loyal death and we fully expected to follow your example in showing our devotion to our country. But your hard and brave fighting had always been of such great effect that every battle of the Imperial forces ended in victory. The successive attacks on Port Arthur settled the trend of the war, and the Battle of the Japan Sea [i.e. Tsushima] decided by one engagement its issue, and thereafter not a single enemy vessel was to be seen at sea. This result, though it arose from the fathomless Imperial virtue, must also be attributed to the service you rendered regardless of your own lives. Now, when, the war having come to an end, we officers and men who have returned in triumph, behold scenes of jubilation on all sides, we are opposed by an unspeakable feeling resulting from joy being dashed with sorrow by the thought that you are unable to join with us in these rejoicings. But the way you died loyally and gallantly will long be the spirit of our Navy and will guard our Empire forever. With this commemorative service we hold a mass for your spirits and express our feelings towards you. We beseech you to gather on this place and hear us.3
Tōgō delivered the last line with a mighty bellow, silencing the birdsong of Aoyama. In the quiet that followed, a breeze blew up through the autumn leaves, whirling them in a magical confetti about the mourners. It was, assuredly, just the wind. But it was ‘just the wind’ that had defeated the medieval Mongol invasion and helped to fight off the British at Kagoshima. To the Japanese, whose native religion sees spirits in everything and divinity in the most mundane of objects, it was as if Tōgō’s departed sailors had returned for one last roll-call. ‘Those present at the ceremony,’ noted one writer, ‘say that it was the most dramatic moment in the history of the war.’4
The silence reigned for several minutes, as Tōgō was too overcome to speak and the audience too respectful to make a move. But soon, Tōgō beckoned the families of the dead to him and gave to each mourner a sacred Eurya branch as an offering. As the ceremony wound down, his fellow admirals waited by the gates to take their carriages back to headquarters, but Tōgō lingered among the crowds, helping widows and children into their waiting rickshaws.
The Combined Squadron was officially disbanded after a huge naval review off Yokohama, attended by the Emperor himself. With the Mikasa out of action, it was the Shikishima that flew Tōgō’s farewell signal, an old samurai proverb that cautioned against complacency: ‘At the moment of victory, tighten the strings of your helmet.’
Tōgō elaborated on this comment in a private address to his surviving men, in which he urged them to cultivate their spirit. Nor was this an idle gesture of numinous influence – Tōgō pressed home the belief that he had maintained throughout the months before the Russo-Japanese war: that preparation and training in peacetime was the only way to ensure victory when it counted. True to his training, Tōgō could not help but bring up the history of British sea power:
[T]he English navy which had won the Battles of the Nile and Trafalgar at the beginning of the nineteenth century, not only put the country in perfect security, but fully maintained its military power even for later generations and, by keeping pace with the progress of the world, has been able to this day to protect its national interests and extend its national influence.5
Tōgō’s days at sea were over, at least as a commander. He would be a passenger for the rest of his life, promoted to the level where he was largely kept on land. In December 1905, he was appointed as the new Chief of Staff for the Navy, succeeding his old commanding officer Itō Sukeyuki, who had been promoted to Fleet Admiral. One of his first duties was to attend the launch of the Tsukuba, a large armoured cruiser that was due to take to sea on Boxing Day 1905. Tōgō travelled down to the docks on the Imperial train, in the company of Yoshihito, the Japanese Crown Prince and future Taishō Emperor.
The Crown Prince had a reputation in court circles for strange behaviour, and this trip was no exception. As Tōgō passed down the train, the Crown Prince began tapping the shoulder of Tōgō’s subordinate Ogasawara Naganari in a most unregal fashion. He urged Ogasawara to run ahead and check that Tōgō was all right, as the couplings between the carriages were hazardous. Ogasawara froze, paralysed by the etiquette that forbade him from pushing past a member of the Imperial family. Impatient, the Crown Prince practically pushed Ogasawara ahead of him, much to the latter’s embarrassment. When Ogasawara reported this incident to Tōgō, the Admiral hung his head and wept ‘with the tears rolling down his cheeks’. The Crown Prince of Japan himself, it seemed, rated Tōgō as a national treasure, but Tōgō’s concern was less likely to be about himself than his Imperial fan – the Crown Prince’s behaviour was becoming steadily more erratic, and it did not bode well for the Japanese monarchy.6
But it was Tōgō who captured the public imagination. Despite his efforts to suppress a personality cult in his name, his picture continued to adorn posters, biscuit tins and flags all over Japan. The Japanese public continued to endow him with divine status, and Tōgō continued to find it deeply embarrassing. He attempted to play the great statesman and began to compose obtuse, rather dull poems as befitted a great potentate, but the tales that linger of the elder Tōgō continue to emphasise his quiet, shy nature.7
Others were not
above taking advantage of his fame. The signpost to the Tōgō household was forever being stolen by souvenirhunters, not merely because of its subject, but because the simple wooden board was known to be an example of the great Admiral’s calligraphy. As he grew older, Tōgō became increasingly less willing to dash off poems and autographs, which ironically only increased the incidences of people trying to cash in on his fame. On one occasion, Tōgō was aghast to discover that a boyhood friend was not quite the old pal he had thought. The man would regularly visit Tōgō and request samples of his calligraphy, but Tōgō grew suspicious when his old schoolmate became so keen that he even brought along the ink, paper and brushes, and began grinding the ink himself. Eventually, the old acquaintance admitted that he took the Admiral’s calligraphy away to sell. When the original source of Tōgō memorabilia refused to play along, other individuals turned to forgery. Tōgō had never visited a police station before, but was invited to the West Kanda precinct to make a statement about the nature of fake Tōgō calligraphy, then in circulation.8
In 1906, Tōgō received a petulant piece of fan mail from a boy in Niigata, who had heard so many stories about Tōgō’s divine prowess that he had found the sight of the man himself to be something of an anti-climax. The postcard read: ‘I thought you were a god, but now I see you are a man. Can the Sea of Japan be protected by men?’9 The child’s blunt statement supposedly moved Tōgō to tears; but three years after his victory at Tsushima, his face was still plastered on tourist knick-knacks in harbour towns, and Japanese ladies still wore hairclips in the shape of battleships. Entirely without the owner’s approval, Tōgō’s name found its way onto uncountable products as an invincible brand, including Tōgō Crackers, Tōgō Dumplings and Tōgō Soap. The adoration was not limited to Japan; in Canada, when the small hamlet of Pelly Siding was upgraded to village status in 1906, the locals elected to change their home’s name to Tōgō, Saskatchewan. In San Francisco, the comic artist Henry Kiyama lampooned the national hero by drawing a strip about a man who dreams he becomes rich by opening Tōgō Shoes, a store that sells shoes ‘as strong as Admiral Tōgō’. Meanwhile, in Tokyo at a trade fair, the aging Admiral came face to face with a statue of himself made almost entirely of mushrooms and biscuits. ‘The Admiral,’ noted a colleague, ‘could hardly control himself from smiling at the sight.’10
Tōgō was decorated again, with the Order of the Golden Kite and the Grand Cordon of the Chrysanthemum, and served on a medals committee that evaluated the deeds of others in the Russo-Japanese War. By 1906, he had taken matters into his own hands, collaborating with his army associate General Nogi on a monument to the 22,719 Japanese war dead. Their 281-foot Tower of Loyalty was built on top of Baiyu (‘White Jade’) hill at Port Arthur and completed in November 1909. Although regarded as a noble gesture in Japan, Tōgō’s monument was deeply unwelcome to the Chinese – modern tourist brochures claim that the tower was built with the unwilling participation of some 20,000 Chinese labourers, many of whom died in its construction.11
Tōgō was released from his responsibilities as Chief of Staff a mere month after he attended the solemn dedication of the tower. He was now made a member of the Council of Admirals and appointed to the High Military Council. But with no war to fight, his duties remained largely ceremonial. In 1911, he and General Nogi sailed on the Kamo Maru in the company of Prince Higashi-Fushimi, as part of the Japanese delegation to attend the coronation of the British King George V.
Passengers and crew expecting a performance from Tōgō were sorely disappointed. He kept to himself throughout the voyage, and spent most of the long trip playing Go in silence with General Nogi. Not even a party, given on the sixth anniversary of the Battle of Tsushima, could tempt Tōgō into making a grand speech. ‘During the whole of the journey on the Kamo Maru,’ sulked London’s Daily Express, ‘no passenger heard either the admiral or the general say anything more than a monsyllable.’
Theirs was the silence of men whose worth is measured by great deeds. Sometimes a passenger who was acquainted with them would be so bold as to approach them with a passing remark on the weather. But both Admiral Tōgō and General Nogi only nodded or shook their heads.12
The sole comment heard from General Nogi for the whole trip was a single word of profane frustration, spat out involuntarily when he missed a putt at deck-golf. After fifty-seven quiet days, the Kamo Maru docked on the outer reaches of the Thames, where they were met by the Japanese ambassador.13 From there, they took the train into London, arriving on 19 June.
It had been many years since Tōgō was in London, and the city was decked out for the festivities. To Tōgō’s further embarrassment, he continued to attract relatively greater attention than the Prince. In an attempt to stay out of trouble, he went with the other minor members of the Japanese suite direct to Westminister Abbey on 22 June for the Coronation, leaving the Prince and Princess Higashi-Fushimi to wave at the crowds in the procession. He had less luck avoiding attention on his way out of the ceremony. While the Prince and Princess went on to Buckingham Palace, Tōgō tried to make his way with Nogi back to their London quarters at Seaford House, only to face a shrieking crowd of well-wishers and handkerchief-wavers.
Not everyone in England was pleased to see Tōgō. An unnamed artist, commissioned to paint Tōgō’s portrait, found the small, unassuming and silent man to have none of the military bearing appropriate for a celebrity portrait. He sent Tōgō away on nine occasions without explanation, until one of Tōgō’s aides was moved to ask why the portrait was not yet done. ‘It is no good today,’ complained the artist. ‘This Tōgō is not the world-renowned Tōgō. He lacks the spirit worthy of his name.’ Tōgō himself, who had often expressed unease with his undesired status, was plainly within earshot of this scolding. ‘His face,’ noted his adjutant, ‘buried in his white beard, flushed like a virgin maid.’14
The round of celebratory parties was over within a week, and the Japanese suite were relieved of their official duties and relocated from government accommodation to hotels. The British press, already disappointed at Tōgō’s reticence when facing reporters, had all but given up trying to get any quotes out of him; and many press reports concluded almost apologetically, with the note that despite his limited responses, Tōgō was merely a shy man and not a rude one. Making the best out of his continued shyness, the press began to dub him the Silent Admiral, a sobriquet that the British public soon embraced with their customary cheekiness. It seems that nobody had taken the Japanese aside for a crash course in the British sense of humour. Many years after the trip to England, at the time of Tōgō’s funeral, his travelling companion Taniguchi Naomi, by then an Admiral himself, remained utterly bemused by the 1911 London crowds, who persisted in chasing after Tōgō’s motorcade and yelling: ‘Speech! Speech!’15
It was left to an intrepid reporter from the Times to break the biggest story of the Silent Admiral. The day after the Coronation, Tōgō travelled back out along the Thames in order to pay a visit to his old training ship, the Worcester. Ever since the Russo-Japanese war, he had been the school’s most famous alumnus. Correspondence between Tōgō and his old mentor, Captain Henderson-Smith, had only ceased with the latter’s death, but plans to bring him back to the Worcester had been afoot for five years. Shortly after the Russo-Japanese war, he had been invited to sail a Japanese battleship up the Thames in order to make the Worcester’s prize-giving and graduation ceremony that year an occasion to remember. He had, unsurprisingly, declined the offer, but did so in a polite letter that kept channels of communication open in case he was ever in town. With his official duties out of the way, Tōgō was unable to resist, and dragged a group of Japanese officers on an impromptu trip along the Kent coast. He had very carefully timed it to ensure that he would be in town in time for the nautical college’s anniversary celebrations, and the persistence of the Times reporter paid off when other journalists had given up. To an audience of assembled graduates of the Worcester, at a private function at Pri
nce’s Restaurant, the legendarily quiet man delivered a long and moving speech.
Tōgō, at the head of six Japanese naval officers and diplomats, had bowed in Japanese fashion on entering the dining room. Ready for this oriental gesture, the assembled sailors rose to their feet and bowed in return. That, it seemed, would be the summit of their interactions, until the closing stages of the meal, when the President, Captain A H F Young, proposed a toast to Tōgō’s health. Much to everyone’s surprise, Tōgō got to his feet, eyed the hushed crowd, and cleared his throat. After weeks of silence, Tōgō spoke, an act for which he would receive a standing ovation.
Your Excellencies and Gentlemen, Worcester is a name very dear to me, and one which I have never for a moment forgotten during the last thirty years. It gives me the greatest pleasure to think that this, my second visit to England, has enabled me to satisfy my long cherished desire, which was to look once more on the dear old Worcester, and meet you all who are so dear to me… . You are all of different ages and different professions, and I, for instance, am of a different nationality, but there is one bond that joins us all here, and that bond is the Worcester. Seeing you here this evening, I feel as if I were meeting again the friends of my youth, and my mind goes back to the old days when as a young man aboard the Worcester I was taught with some of you how to make knots and splices. At the same time, my memory recalls to me the form and voice of my old master, Captain Smith … During our late war he often wrote to me kind letters, which were a source of great comfort and encouragement to me, coming as they did from far-off England, which to me is a second mother-country. The portraits of Captain and Mrs Smith adorn, together with a photograph of the Worcester, my study in my home at Tokyo, and are among my most valued treasures. While I rejoice that I have been able to visit dear old England, and to see once again Mrs Smith, I am filled with deepest regret to find that Captain Smith has left us without waiting for me to come to England, and thus deprived me of the opportunity of personally expressing my gratitude and thanking him for his kindness in the past. This Worcester Association, which is composed of old boys who studied maritime science under the superintendance of Captain Smith and his predecessors and successors, long may it flourish!16